Our Men in the Marathon: The Day After

Sunday morning featured nearly cloudless skies, bright sun, and mild-to-cool temperatures. It was an ideal day for the more than forty-five thousand people who started the New York City Marathon. By the days end, an unofficial count of 48,829 had finished, roughly two thousand had sought medical attention, one famous miner from Chile had bested his hoped-for finish time of six hours, and two first-timers in New York—Gebre Gebremariam, of Ethiopia, and Edna Kiplagat, of Kenya—had taken top honors in the men’s and women’s fields. (Dathan Ritzenhein, whom Jennifer Kahn wrote about in last week’s issue, finished eighth in the men’s division.)

And what about our marathoning colleagues at The New Yorker? Nicholas Thompson was the top finisher at just over two hours and forty-two minutes, putting him in a hundred and forty-second place in the men’s field, and first among forty-eight registered Thompsons in the field.

“At the very end I outsprinted a man who claimed to be the top finisher from Luxembourg,” Thompson said. “At first, I was pleased. But I see in the results that he started in a pack behind me and actually ran faster. This dampens my excitement.”

Peter Hessler came in at two hours and forty-five minutes (first Hessler, among two). And Willing Davidson clocked in at three hours and twenty-seven minutes (beating twelve other Davidsons.)

A couple of lessons from yesterday’s race. First, that running a marathon is hard—for writers, editors, or even football players. Amani Toomer, a former wide receiver for the New York Giants, was among the last runners to start the race, and per his deal with Timex, earned a dollar for the New York Road Runners Youth Program for every runner he passed. Toomer estimates that he went by about twenty thousand, though by mile twenty-three, he hit a wall, and missed his goal of finishing in under four hours.

“It was a lot tougher than I thought,” Toomer told ESPN. “It feels a lot like the end of a football game actually.”

“Kind of a rough day, in which I did a lot of thinking about the futility of all human activity,” Davidson said about his own race. “But ten minutes after the finish, wrapped in Mylar, I was pretty happy. Later, I found out that my local liquor store delivers!”

That leads to the second lesson: think booze. Second place in the women’s race went to Shalane Flanagan, an American, who was running not just her first New York City Marathon, but her first marathon anywhere. (She’s an Olympic distance runner, but still.) What’s next on her agenda? “A nice trip to Hawaii and a burger and a beer.”

Nicholas Thompson went the beer route as well, and today, reported a marathon-specific version of the hangover. “My arms feel great. Otherwise, I’m suffering. My legs are throbbing from the race; my stomach is aching from all the cookies and beer I consumed afterward.”

Ian Crouch is a contributing writer and producer for newyorker.com. He lives in Maine.